Author Topic: A Reminder About "RP Etiquette"  (Read 3260 times)

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Offline DaveIronside

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A Reminder About "RP Etiquette"
« on: June 05, 2020, 12:50:33 PM »
Over the last 24-48 hours or so we've had a mess on Discord over a number of RP issues. As RP Mod I'd like to make a few things very clear.

1. RP DOES NOT TAKE PLACE ON DISCORD. IT HAS NOT HAPPENED UNLESS IT IS STATED ON THE FORUM. This has to be our number one rule. The Discord channel changes so quickly and can be hard to keep track of especially as we seem to have kind of three active RL regions, we've a USA timezone group, a European timezone group and I believe an Australian/South East Asian timezone group. The problem comes that generally between 11pm and 7am (GMT) I'm asleep and therefore I'm not reading what happens, meanwhile the guys in the States are chatting away. If we were to class what was said on Discord as canon I then have to filter through 8hours or so of chat to work out whats going on as well as filter out what people are saying as a joke and what is serious RP. For example I often joke about a rouge Honeybadger called Stoffel causing problems in Ardia, beyond one RP that's not canon because it's not on the forum. By all means plot and discuss theoretical ideas and opinions on Discord but until it appears on the forum it has not happened.

2. Blurring IC and OOC - We've seen a lot of decisions made by countries taken personally. Don't do this. It would be like me being angry at Carrie Fisher because Princess Leia didn't give Chewbacca a medal because she's racist. We're ROLE PLAYING, no decisions are taken personally and often the views of other nations doesn't mean the user feels that way. I know for a fact Hassfurt is not a racist person in RL, I know for a fact Kris is not anti-Christian in RL, I know for a fact I don't have an obsession with Honeybadgers in real life......ok maybe not the last one but you get the idea. I've seen lots of insults and name calling being thrown around on Discord because of decisions nations make on the forum.

3. RETCONS. We're seeing more and more of these. When you retcon it's not just you that you impact its others. For example if I was to retcon Royal Seleucid's involvement in the genocide of Cultists I've suddenly impacted East Moreland, Achkaerin, Lodja, The Iwi, Ui Cenneslaig, and also possibly people like Tamora and others who have a history built with RS since then. Even if its done quickly people have perhaps been thinking out or drafting posts based on what you've said. Have the courage to follow through after all its story writing and the stuff that people retcon is often retconned because it causes the most problems IC speaking, that therefore means interesting RP. I am not however saying NEVER Retcon, there will be times it is needed. For example I got bored of Mercia and created Royal Seleucid to replace it. I worked with those this impacted to create a history for Royal Seleucid which meant they essentially changed the name Mercia to Royal Seleucid. Likewise sometimes you may make mistakes, for example I recently made a post about CNN laws impacting slavery, I worded them really really badly and even the other CNN members were puzzled at how they differed to what we'd discussed. This has been retconned for now while we tidy it up. However this retcon was done quickly and impacted very few people. If you are going to retcon it's potentially going to piss people off, just work with what happens, its more fun that way. Also we all know Retcon is for pussies ;)

4. Follow through - We've lots of RP's that start and never get completed for various reasons. Some of these will naturally happen such as people's real lives get in the way and the event they were connected to has ended once they get back online. What the big problem however is when we see RP's that have lost steam because one person has just left it and doesn't want to continue. An example we talk about a lot regarding this is the fact that King Finley of Ui Cenneslaig has been standing in a forest in East Moreland for around two years now. If you start an RP with someone you should do everything reasonable to see it through. It becomes disheartening to people when they wait on posts and see the person they were working with create new RP's. We all know how much we can handle, try and stay within that realm.

5. Create oppurtunities - Try and think beyond your own nation. Having news-stories about the goings on in your nation is great, it adds flavour to your country and allows you to perhaps develop aspects of culture. You can use every post to though give others things to write about. A great example of this is Tamora. Very few of their news posts don't include something you're media or your foreign office couldn't talk about or get involved in. Even the small things can lead to RP's. For example just a few hours ago San Huberto wrote about a Pride festival being cancelled in their nation by the Police, within the next couple of hours you can expect to see mention of a small protest outside their embassy in Northfort. This is good I think for two reasons. I could potentially spark an idea between me and San Huberto for a RP we'd like to do, or even if that doesn't happen it shows the author what they write is seen as valuable for the region's RP.

If anyone has anything they'd like me to address, cover, comment on etc regarding anything I've said please feel free to get in touch.


and remember Retcon is for Pussies